


the answer to everything

by freshwoods



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, References to Illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 11:49:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18031193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freshwoods/pseuds/freshwoods
Summary: Stucky +things you didn’t say at all, things you said when you were scared, things you said that i wasn’t meant to hear(repost)





	the answer to everything

**Author's Note:**

> This is a repost from my old orphaned account.

The starless night hangs over them as they walk through the city, weaving in and out of alleyways, crossing under street lights. It’s raining, the two of them soaked to the skin. Bucky keeps throwing Steve sideways glances, like maybe he doesn’t think Steve can see with the shadowed dark surrounding them, like he doesn’t want Steve to know he’s looking, watching, waiting for any sign that Steve’s not okay. If Steve’s lungs weren’t starting to burn, his body starting to feel cold even with the warm spring rain and the jacket he’s got on, he thinks he would be annoyed. But as it is, he just keeps walking, just keeps avoiding the way Bucky looks at him. The city’s alive with tires on wet pavement, the splash of puddles, the pitter-patter of the rain on overhangs of doorways. They pass people huddled in entryways, lit up only when the lamps allow. They make to cross the street, but the light changes.

Steve almost doesn’t see the car, and it’s only Bucky’s hand on his shoulder that stops him from stepping off the curb. He looks up at the other man, half his face lit by the red glow of the stoplight, the other half in shadow. Bucky’s eyebrows draw together a little as he looks at Steve—Steve thinks he must be visibly shivering by now—and he opens his mouth, like he’s going to say something. Steve can’t help but look, watch the way his lips part, before he’s looking back at the other man. But Bucky’s lips just press into a hard line and he huffs, leaning down just a little, just enough that some of his slicked-back hair falls into his face—the pomade he used this morning no match for the precipitation—and reaches out toward Steve with both hands, turning up the collar of his coat. Steve gives Bucky a sheepish smile, even as Bucky shakes his head, the two of them caught in the memory of too many conversations held between them just like this, of Bucky telling Steve he’ll catch his death out here one day.

But he doesn’t say that now. Instead, Bucky just gives Steve a long look, eyes moving over his face as something vulnerable sneaks in to his expression, like maybe the shadow of night brings something else inside his head to light, or like there’s something on Steve’s own face that begs that look from Bucky. The light changes, and people come out from inside doorways to cross the street, and they break eye contact. Bucky drops his hands from Steve’s collar, and Steve feels even colder.

-

His fever spikes slowly, then all at once. It’s the early hours of the morning when he wakes, having trouble breathing, his chest feeling tight, rattling like a bird in a cage. He starts to sweat when the sun finally breaks the day. He’s shivering, shaking, all but gasping in each breath when a knock finally sounds on his bedroom door. He knows it’s Bucky. Bucky—who knocks on his door every morning to wake him up, because Steve’s a chronic over-sleeper. Normally, Steve would yell something witty about how Bucky ain’t his Ma, but this morning it’s all he can do to focus on breathing and pull the blanket his mother crocheted for him tighter around himself.

“Steve?” Another knock.

Steve just lets out a loud, shaky exhale.

A moment of silence, and then Steve hears the handle of his door turning. “Stevie? You decent?” But he comes in before Steve can even try to speak. Steve watches as Bucky’s eyes sweep over him, taking in the situation all at once, and then he’s rushing over. “Christ, Steve.” He lifts a hand to push his hair back out of his face as he squats down near the side of Steve’s bed, then reaches out, pressing the back of his hand to Steve’s forehead. Steve closed his eyes at the touch. “How long you been like this?”

Steve tries to shrug, as if it’s nothing, as if he can’t already feel the tell-tale makings of another bout of pneumonia in his chest, as if the thready sound of his own breathing is any less scary to his ears than it is to Bucky’s. “A-a while.”

Bucky’s face gets a pinched expression, and he reaches out again, this time pushing Steve’s sweat-slicked hair from his face. “How bad?”

Steve knows he should say something to ease Bucky’s mind, knows that he’s got better things to do than sit here feeling sorry for Steve being sick,  _again_ , because of his own stupidity. But when he goes to speak, it’s like all his air is gone, like he’s drowning from within, and he can’t breathe, just keeps trying and failing to take in gulping silent breaths while everything inside of him starts to burn.

He’s aware—distantly—of Bucky’s frantic voice, of his name, of warm hands on his bare shoulders, shaking him gently, then holding his face as Steve looks with unseeing eyes.

“…Steve? Damn it all, Steve, you can’t do this to me. C’mon, you punk, just breathe…”

And Steve’s  _trying_  to, so damn hard, but there’s a fist inside his chest, clenching, clenching, clenching—and then it’s gone, just as suddenly as it came on, and Steve heaves with it: big, gasping breaths that hurt his weak lungs, but he drags the air in anyway.

“Jesus Christ, Steve!” Bucky’s still holding his face, the soft pad of his thumb sweeping over the curve of Steve’s cheek. Steve turns his cheek into the touch, just a little—but just enough that Bucky seems to finally notice exactly what he’s doing and drops his hands like Steve’s skin’s scalded him. “I thought—I thought—” But Bucky looks away, lips pressed tight together, like if he opens them now, he won’t be able to stop the flood of things he wants to say.

And there are things, too, on the tip of Steve’s tongue, so many things he wants to say to Bucky—he wants to feel Bucky’s soft hands on his face again, wants Bucky to look at him like he actually  _sees_  him for once in his goddamned life. He thinks of how easy it would be to reach up and bring Bucky’s face down to Steve’s to guide their lips together, to give in to the urge that’s been building inside of him every time Bucky looks at him.

Instead, all Steve manages to get out is a gasping “Doctor”.

-

It’s a month later, a light summer rain just beginning to drizzle as they walk home together. The daylight catches the drops and it makes the grungy streets glitter, the sun still shining, not quite covered by the clouds. Steve keeps scanning the streets for a rainbow, but the brownstones keep getting in the way. It’s beautiful; the kind of easy summer day that makes Steve want to stop and sketch. He almost asks Bucky a couple times if they can stop, but the other man keeps looking over at Steve and scowling. Steve doesn’t really blame him—he’s only been out of the hospital for just over a week. But his lungs are back to his normal and he feels better than ever.

He catches the other man scowling once again when Steve wipes a drop of rain from his face. He laughs a little. “Jesus, Buck. If you ain’t careful, that mug of yours’ll get stuck like that.”

Bucky, impossibly, scowls harder, but looks away, hunching his shoulders. “Shuddup about my ugly mug for once, will ya?”

Steve laughs again and mumbles, “I never said it was  _ugly_ ,” under his breath.

Bucky shoots him a sharp look before that unreadable expression comes back over his face. He shakes his head, hair once again falling a bit into his face. He says something under his breath—and if it were raining any harder, or if the wind were blowing, or a car passing, Steve might not’ve heard it at all. But he does, and he stops walking, feet faltering.

“What’d you say?”

And Bucky’s stopped, too; eyes widening, mouth floundering. “I—I didn’t—”

“Because I do. Mean it, I mean.” And Bucky’s just  _watching_  him now, like he’s maybe finally actually  _seeing_  Steve. Somehow that gives Steve the courage to keep going, to say the things he keeps meaning to, keeps trying to, but it’s never the right time, and he’s always too scared. “Geez, ya big dumb log, I’ve only been in love with you for half my life.”

The words are out there, and Steve can’t take them back—doesn’t want to. But his head suddenly feels too light and his heart starts beating too fast. He starts walking, not looking back, not wanting to see just what’s on Bucky’s face. He walks without seeing the way the rain plays on the city streets or the way the sun reflects in all of the store windows.

He doesn’t get very far before there’s a hand on his shoulder—solid, warm, Bucky—and he’s turning Steve around to face him. Bucky’s lips are moving, but it’s hard to hear anything over the rushing in his ears.

“What—but you—?” Bucky’s all big blue eyes, pale, like the sky, pinning him in place with his stare. “Steve?” He says his name on a whisper, like it’s the most important question he’s ever asked, like the answer will make or break the rest of his life. And, geez, the way he’s looking at Steve. Steve can’t look away, can only stare up at him, take in every detail of his face, commit it to his deepest memory in case he never gets to look at Bucky like this again.

“Had to—” Steve clears his suddenly dry throat. “Had to tell you, Buck. Thought you should know. Sorry, I—sorry.” He makes to leave again, wants nothing more than to run away from this—for the first time in his life, too scared to let the battle play out the way he knows it’s going to—but Bucky doesn’t let him budge.

“Jesus, Buck, wouldya let me go?” Steve snaps, moving his hand up to try to break the grip on Steve’s shoulder. “I said I’m sorry, alright? Look, just forget it. You don’t—”

Suddenly, unbelievably, lips press against lips. Too chapped, too hard, too quick. Bucky pulls away the next second, smile soft on his face, moving the hand on Steve’s shoulder up to cradle his face. Bucky lets out an amused huff and sweeps his thumb over the curve of Steve’s cheek. “If I’da known all it takes to shut you up is a kiss, I woulda done that ages ago.”

Steve feels his mouth open and close a few times. “I—but you? Bucky?” And there it is again—that question—of something so much more, something neither one knows quite how to voice, how to ask for, how to put into words what they need, what they feel.

“Yeah.” Bucky says, stealing one more fleeting kiss while the street is clear. “Yeah.” And maybe it’s the answer to everything.


End file.
